this post was submitted on 21 Oct 2023
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Physics

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If distilled water is non-conductive, why do extreme overclockers need to worry about condensation? (lemmy.ml)
submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Extreme overclocking involves cooling a CPU to subzero temperatures using an air conditioner, dry ice or liquid nitrogen. This causes the surrounding air to cool down, forming droplets on the CPU, motherboard and heat sink. Overclockers prevent droplets from accumulating on the motherboard using petroleum jelly or some sort of absorbent insulating material.

Since this condensation comes from the air, I figure it should be free of impurities, just like distilled water. This should mean that the droplets shouldn't be able to cause a short circuit. Due to the low temperature, corrosion shouldn't be a problem either.

Am I missing something here?

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Any contamination (even CO2 from the air) will make it conductive enough to cause corrosion, eventually ruining the circuit board. Once this corrosion starts, it can add metal ions into the water, further increasing conductivity, leading to more corrosion. If you've ever tried to build an electrolysis cell you will know how good water and electricity are at dissolving metal. (Even thick wires can disappear in minutes)